London Lightning rally to snap three-game skid

If there’s any game that can get the London Lightning going in the right direction, this one was the game.

The Lightning won a stunning come-from-behind victory over the Niagara River Lions 108-96 Friday in St. Catharines.

It was their first win in four games and they did it with a short bench and having their top best players ejected late in the first half.

It was difficult to imagine this season getting any worse for the Lightning.

But it looked like it was going to get a lot worse when they looked down and out against the River Lions.

But they staged a critical, desperate and astonishing second-half comeback to come away with a win that looked improbable at best at the half.

“You try and have next man up mentality,” said Lightning coach Keith Vassell. “There’s no other issues you just got to do what you got to do and the guys understood that. The amazing thing about it is we weren’t thinking about anything else. We were in the moment and just tried to do everything we could to get the win.”

Then again there still may be bad news becasue they haven’t heard from the league about what the fallout is going to be from actions in the game. There likely will be further punishments.

“I’m disappointed and I’ll have to address that with them,” Vassell said.

The 1-4 start appeared to affect the Lightning. They lacked flow, intensity and couldn’t check a coat at a coat check in the first half.

It boiled over on Friday when Royce White, last year’s most valuable player in the National Basketball League of Canada, nailed River Lions forward Marvell Waithe with a forearm to the chin away from the play late in the second quarter. White was immediately ejected. During the following free-for-all, Waithe approached the Lightning bench and exchanged words with the bench. Ryan Anderson was also ejected for exchanging words with Waithe. As White was heading to the Lightning dressing room, he had to be held back when it appeared someone said something to him. He was feet away from getting into it on the River Lions’ bench.

White left the game without scoring a point.

“If we play like we played today and we got a loss, I’m just happy we played with everything that we had,” Vassell said. “We haven’t been doing that. So this is the result of us playing with everything we have. Now it’s a situation where the guys believe in each other and what we are doing and everybody can trust each other. Everybody contributed.”

The Lightning was also without DeAndre Thomas. With White and Anderson’s ejections the Lightning were left with seven players in the lineup. Thomas was released from the Lightning earlier Friday.

The Lightning finished the half trailing 45-35, their lowest first-half points total ever.

The Lightning fell behind by 10 in the first quarter and played catch-up all game. It’s been something they’ve done every game they’ve played.

But just when things looked bleakest the Lightning came out in the second half and seemed to be settled away, less anxious and more disciplined.

The Lightning got a major boost from Martin Dixon-Green with 17 points off the bench. Garrett Williamson had 19 and Joel Friesen-Latty added 16. Williamson and Latty provided real leadership.

Sam Muldrow had 20 for the River Lions while Omar Strong added 19.

The smaller Lightning lineup out-rebounded the River Lions 52-44.

The River Lions probably thought it was blow out time but the Bolts took faced them down in the third quarter. They outscored the River Lions 41-25, scoring more points in the third quarter than they did in the entire first half. They took a 76-70 lead into the final quarter and built on that from there. They scored 73 points in the second half.

They played tough defence, hit big shots and moved the basketball.

The River Lions helped them without question. When White and Anderson went out and a 10-point halftime lead, they looked as if they had already chalked up the win.

But the River Lions went frosty in the second half the Lightning didn’t give them a lot of second chances off the offensive boards and came away with a what should be a reinvigorating win.

The Lightning take on the Windsor Express Saturday at Budweiser Gardens at 7 p.m.

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